Downside
by WeBuiltThePyramids
Summary: Walter is a firm believer in doing things for the greater good. But this time, Paige is one of the potential losses.
1. Chapter 1

**I'd been thinking of writing something like this for a while, and while watching the rerun of Young Hearts Spark Fire tonight, I finally got something concrete to work on. This is going to be three chapters probably, to be published (hopefully) in the next week or so.**

* * *

Paige's head was throbbing.

This didn't exactly happen _often_ , but she'd had this headache before. She'd banged her head on something, but she couldn't for the life of her think of what. She'd had a very pleasant evening, watching a movie with Ralph and going to bed early, and all she had done this morning was take him to school and stop to get color coordinated post it notes before work…

Paige frowned. She wasn't in the garage, nor was there any reason she should be laying on the floor of a dimly lit room at all, much less at this time of the day.

Suddenly, it hit her that this was absolutely not someplace she had consented to being, and a muffled scream forced its way through the material that had been shoved into her mouth as she came full consciousness and realized she was bound and gagged. Struggling into a sitting position, eyes wide, gag preventing her panicked sounds from going far, she looked wildly around.

 _Where the Hell am I? How did I get here?_

She frantically thought about what she remembered last. She was at the office supplies store, Walter had called her about a case and she was trying to access his second voicemail when a voice had come over the store intercom. She'd shoved her phone down her shirt, held in place by her bra, and tried to act as if the sound hadn't startled her. She paid…she was walking to her car…

Everything was fuzzy after that.

She stood, noticing a small amount of light coming from up above. A window. Gathering herself, Paige jumped in the air. Her hands weren't free to hold herself up for a better view, but it didn't matter – all she had was a view of the landscaping and that wasn't going to help her any. What she needed to do was get free and get help.

Paige tried to use her tongue to push what she thought was a crumpled up T-shirt from her mouth, gagging at the effort. She glanced around. Her wallet was not there, nor any sign of her purse. A slight shifting of weight told her that her phone was still lodged nicely between her breasts – an advantage, if she could get to it. She wiggled her hands, desperate to loosen the ropes. If Toby was here, he'd suggest that whoever had taken her was no stranger to crime – she was bound, had no memory of her abduction, and was clearly in a secluded hiding spot – but who wasn't used to kidnappings and the like, as her hands were tied _in front_ of her. If she could get the shirt out of her mouth, she could use her teeth to help with the knots. Allowing her gag reflex to take over, Paige coughed and vomited; the shirt was forced out of her mouth. Her first instinct was to do what she did in most intense situations – make noise – but she stopped herself, doubting anyone would hear her who was interested in helping her out.

She raised her wrists to her mouth and began tugging at the knots.

* * *

"This is definitely our guy," Agent Cody said, pointing to one of the suspects on his whiteboard. "Logan Ammo."

"Logan Ammo?" Toby said. "Why not Logan TNT? He is a bomber after all…"

"This isn't the funniest situation I've ever been in," Cody said, "but I can wait until you're finished."

"I'm not sure I like your teacher attitude," Toby said.

"Cool it." Cabe addressed Cody with raised eyebrows. "So that's the guy who has threatened to set off four bombs in the Los Angeles area. But his social media and friends are giving no inkling that he might be wanting to end his life. So how does he do it?"

"He's planning on detonating the bombs from his safe house," Cabe said. He zoomed in on the screen. "It's that one, that wooden house with all the yellow flowers out front. It's definitely out of the city."

"How can you tell those are flowers from that grainy ass picture?" asked Cody.

Cabe didn't blink. "Could be tree blossoms. Could be poorly maintained grass. Does it really matter?"

"The bombs will go off in forty five minutes if you correctly interpreted his coded message," Merrick said.

"Of course we correctly interpreted it," Toby said, "we're brilliant." He cleared his throat. "Um, but also, he didn't even make up a complex code. He wanted us to decode it, he wants us to know what he's planning."

"So what we do now," Cabe added, "is some of us try to figure out where the bombs are located so we can disarm them, while others try and talk this guy down. He's angry about something. If we can reach out to him we might be able to get him to not detonate the explosives."

There was a shrill ringing sound, and everyone jumped. "God," Happy said, frustrated with herself.

Walter fished his phone out of his pocket. "Oh," he said, moving away from the group, I gotta take this."

* * *

"Come on, come on, pick up." Paige paced the small room, still shivering. If she stayed on the left side of the room – the East side? – she had a signal. "Come on!"

Her phone had given her a brief scare, taking away the elation she'd had at getting a hand free and able to reach it. The phone had sweat on the touch screen and wouldn't work until she'd found a dry part of her shirt – where had she been? – to clean it with. Now, Walter was the one scaring her.

Then she heard his voice. "Hello. Paige?"

"Walter," she said in a stage whisper. "Walter, thank God, listen, I've been abducted."

"Abducted?" his tone changed. "Where is Ralph?"

"He's at school, at least…" she sucked in a breath, "at least I think he's at school. Oh god, what if he came back and took him too?"

"Paige," Walter said, "it's going to be okay. Tell me, are you restrained?"

"I'm locked in a room. It looks like it was a pantry at some point. Nothing on my feet; my hands were tied and I had a gag but…" Paige decided not to explain to him how she still had her phone.

"Can you see anything? Any windows, any indication of where you are?"

"There's a small window up top in here," Paige said. "If I jump, I can see out of it."

"Okay, can you do that for me?"

"There's not much to see," Paige said. "I think we're in the woods…it's secluded…oh," she said, "there are a ton of yellow flowers in the yard, that I can tell you. Listen to me, call Ralph's school!"

* * *

"What?"

Walter's sharp voice momentarily distracted the others from their conversation, but they turned back to one another when he fell silent. "So if we can't talk him down," Cody said, "we'll take out the house. There's very few windows and they're small, so we can't get a visual, but the military has equipment that can make him and his cave into nothing in a matter of seconds."

"We can't do that."

The team and FBI agents once again all turned to look at Walter, who was approaching them with wide eyes. "What do you mean, son?" Cabe asked.

"Paige," Walter said. "He has Paige. She's in that house." He pointed to the grainy image on Cabe's screen. "That...that house."


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the reviews and follows I got on the first chapter! This one is part two of three.**

* * *

Paige heard Walter quickly filling the team in on her situation, learning a bit more about the case they were working in the process. She shifted her weight, moving away from an eyebolt sticking out of the wall, just high enough to be irritating the back of her head. _Not the best time to have this headache._ "Do you think this Ammo guy took me because he wanted to ensure you don't…um…?"

"We're not going to do that, Walter said reassuringly. "You're going to be fine. We're going to keep you on the line…"

"Walter," she said. "Please make sure Ralph is okay."

"I'm on it," Toby said loudly, leaning toward the phone so she could hear him well. "I'm going to get him out of school and bring him to us."

"I'll go with you," Happy said, "just so you don't get knocked out too."

"Stay on the line," Walter said. "I'm not going to let anything happen to you, you understand?"

"Just protect Ralph," she said. "Walter, the bombs are going off in just over a half hour. Please whatever happens to me…"

"Nothing is going to happen to you," Walter said. "We're going to get you out of there and you're going to go home with Ralph tonight and he's never going to know anything is the matter because by the time Toby gets to his school, we're going to have you out."

"Oh God." Her voice dropped. "Walter, I hear someone. I have to hang up, I have to look like I'm still tied if he comes in here."

"No, Paige, just place the phone…" he looked at his phone. "She's gone." He put the phone down. "Okay, so Happy and Toby are going to get Ralph. I'm going to hack into building permit archives online and see if I can't find the basic layout of this house. It was owned by some celebrity's mother in the 1960s, there's got to be a floor plan of it somewhere. We know Paige is in a room near the front. Sylvester, I need you to determine the man and fuel power needed to get us to the house in less than twenty minutes so we have time to canvass in person and…"

"Mr. O'Brien," Cody said, "you just halved your team by sending those two to get the boy from school, we can't have the main focus being getting her out. We need Sylvester looking at population densities, events in the city today, likely locations for the bombs, and we need another man attempting to contact Ammo and get him to delay or change his mind. Paige Dineen is an afterthought."

"Son! Son! _Walter_!" Cabe shouted as Walter lunged forward, pushing Cody back against the wall and holding him by his shirt collar. "You listen to me," he hissed, "Paige is the farthest thing from an afterthought. She's an essential part of this team; without her, we don't work, _do you understand me_?"

"Walter!" Cabe pulled him off of Cody, pushing him away and forcing him to stand still. "Walter, you know he's right. We have to work on stopping the bombs from going off."

"We can do that better if Paige is helping," Walter said. "I'm going to call her back."

"Walter, no," Cabe said. "If her phone rings it could give away that she still has it. If she's able to, she'll call us."

"Guys!" Sylvester shouted. "I have something!"

* * *

"I'm sure by now you've noticed I have your agent," came the voice from the other side of the door. Paige bit her lip and drew her knees up to her chest and leaned back. She hit the eye bolt again and cringed, afraid she'd make a sound that would give away the fact that she was awake. "You will not harm me when I detonate the four bombs."

There was a silence. Paige knew what Cabe or Merrick or whoever was on the other line was doing. "You don't have to do this," "let us help you," "whatever wrong was done to you, it's not worth killing people over." She had an uneasy feeling that it wasn't going to be that simple. She stared at the doorknob, hoping, praying it wouldn't turn. She remembered the scene in Jurassic Park where Ellie said that they were safe, unless the raptors figured out how to open doors, and the next shot was a raptor doing just that. That scene had always given her chills. Now it seemed too real.

There was a chuckle. "Oh, no. That won't be happening. I'll let her go…once the delicious damages have been done. She hasn't seen my face, and she won't. Take that as my token of…goodwill, if you will." Another pause. "Oh," the voice said again. "I wouldn't think of trying to figure out where we are in the house with heat sensors. I've most certainly already thought of that. We shall talk soon…perhaps."

There was a rapping at the door. "Miss Dineen. Your friends are concerned about you. Don't worry. You'll go free once the situation in Los Angeles has been properly executed. Providing you...or they...don't cause any problems."

* * *

"Going off of all the relevant factors," Sylvester said, "I have located seventeen of the most likely places for the four bombs."

"There's no way we search all of them in time," Cabe said. "Any more word from Ammo?"

"Nothing. His phone is switched off. He's probably going to call us back when it's too close to go time for us to get anyone out there to destroy the home." Merrick set his jaw. "I don't like it, Gallo…but I think we have to beat his game."

The light was out of Cabe's eyes as he slowly nodded. "Get the plane ready, have it standing by. And get someone from downstairs to go up in the thing. I won't do it."

"Cabe!" Walter said, a nervous smile coming over his face, "we haven't…even _begun_ to exhaust all of our options. There is extensive technology that can half Sylvester's current estimates in a matter of minutes, we can…"

"Son," Cabe said quietly, "you know that we have to implement Greater Good if this doesn't work out."

"We'll figure it out," Walter said. "We still have thirty minutes."

"We have _barely_ thirty minutes to either find the bombs and disarm them, plus potentially taking out the threat," Cabe reminded him. "We can't spend one hundred percent of our manpower on finding out a way to save Paige. Look, kid," he said, "I know you feel a lot for her. But you know that no matter how hard it may be – and believe me, I wish she was with us – we have to do what's best for the majority in the long run. Hey." He put a hand on Walter's shoulder. "I know it's hard. But we have to think rationally here. I know what it's like to lose someone that you love. And we're not giving up. But it's looking pretty likely there may be casualties we don't want here. And you have to be ready for that."

"We can't…" Walter drew in a deep, painful breath. "We can't destroy that house. We save everybody. Remember?"

"Walter."

"No," he said. "You can't just say my name like that makes it okay. We. Save. Everybody. We rescue Paige, and then take out the house." Walter looked at Cody. "How fast can you get me to the location?"

"We can be there in…" he trailed off, looking behind Walter and Cabe. They turned to see Happy and Toby jogging toward them, Ralph in tow.

"Kid heard about the case on TV and decided to sneak out of school again to come help," Happy said.

"I want to talk to my mom," Ralph said, looking up at her.

"I'm sure she'll call back," Toby said, glancing over at Walter. "I think Walter's going to go with Cody to try and bring her back."

"Walter is going to do no such thing," Merrick protested, looking at Cabe for help.

"We always say we have to look out for the greater good," Cabe said with a shrug, giving Walter a small nod. "Saving Paige and the people in the city is a greater good than just the latter. Walter." He raised his eyebrows at the younger man. "You save everybody. _Everybody_. Understood?"

* * *

Paige waited until several minutes had gone by without any sound from outside the door before she pulled her phone back out of her bra. Her fingers frantically moved over her screen, typing out her message to Ralph. Calling was too risky. She had maybe ten minutes to figure out how she was going to escape, and as much as she wanted to hear her son's voice, as much as she wanted to talk to him, to tell him she loved him and he was the best thing she'd ever done, to assure him that he was a strong boy, and he'd be okay, the way she could prove all of these things to him was to get out. To get back to him.

She had limited resources. The shirt she spit from her mouth and the vomit it was lying in, the rope used to tie her hands, and a tiny window that might be large enough for her to squeeze through but was too high for her to get a good grip on.

She stood up. Walter had gotten out of situations more dire than this. She wasn't Walter, but if she'd learned one thing from him, it was that every problem had a solution.

She began rubbing the back of her head, then froze. Her eyes fell on the eyebolt.


	3. Chapter 3

**I wanted to finish this earlier today, but a few unfortunate things came up. Anyway, hope you guys liked this three parter! I've enjoyed toying with this concept. (Also, Amber? That time Happy told Toby she hated him and he said 'no you don't'? That was me with your review earlier today.)**

* * *

"Please fly faster," Walter said quietly from the passenger seat.

The pilot looked at him with raised eyebrows. "This is military craft. It already goes faster than anything you're used to – and Gallo tells me you're a bit reckless with fast cars. A truck will meet us three miles from the compound. I'll land and let you off with them, then Cody and I will circle nearby to wait for the signal to eliminate Ammo.

"And Paige."

The pilot sighed. "That isn't what we want to do, and you know it." His expression softened ever so slightly. "How long have you guys been together?"

"We aren't," Walter said. "I mean, we've been working together a while, but we aren't a…we aren't like that, it's just…" he looked out the window.

"She means a lot to you."

"I have always believed in doing what's best for the greater good," Walter said. "And I still believe that. I just…I suppose now I realize I've been insensitive discussing it before. With people who may suffer personally from it."

"It's hard," the pilot said. "When I was in Iran, I lost my closest friend in a similar situation. People come home and applaud those who never, ever leave a man behind…but sometimes when it's a man or a whole village, you have to make the decision that won't win you any medals or any people complaining you should have won some courage award most people don't know exists. Look," he said, "she knows you care about her?"

"I don't know." Walter frowned, uncomfortable with the conversation. "On some level, I suppose."

"She won't blame you," he said. "Gallo's always very firm about you not getting any more death on your hands. This isn't your doing. I'm sure she knows that you're doing everything you can."

* * *

Paige remembered when a school counselor had suggested cub scouts might be good for Ralph. He'd lasted three meetings, never actually complaining, but she could tell he wasn't having any fun. She'd talked to one of the mothers after his first meeting, and she'd told Paige how her son was always tying things around the house in the various knots. Paige had learned some of them, hoping that they might engage Ralph. He'd mastered everything she'd prepared for him in a matter of minutes, but he wasn't interested. "Knots can be important, Ralph," she had told him. "You never know, they could save your life someday!"

She hadn't been _completely_ serious, after all, they were living in L.A. where wildlife survival skills weren't exactly critical, but today, Paige thanked Taylor's mother silently as she secured one end of the rope that had held her wrists together to the eyebolt. She tugged on it, hoping it would be strong enough for what she needed it to do.

Glancing over her shoulder at the door, Paige ran the length of the rope through her hands. It would be long enough – this panty wasn't exactly very wide – but she worried about Ammo hearing or seeing the doorknob jiggling. Even if he was actually planning to let her go – and she wasn't naïve enough to really put much faith in that claim – if he noticed her trying to escape, he _would_ kill her.

She looped the rope around her ankle, creating a loose version of the knot, then slid it off her foot. Standing up, Paige gently hooked the loop around the doorknob, giving a few small tugs to tighten it without much commotion.

Paige now had a rope held taut between the door of the panty and the eyebolt below the window. She reached up with her hands. She could barely see out of the window when she jumped – just enough to see all the gaudy yellow fauna – but if she could get up on the rope, she'd have a better chance at hauling herself up and out. She lifted a foot, ready to hop up on the rope, when she suddenly heard a voice from outside the door.

"That's how you get them, sometimes, Oliver," Ammo was saying. "Brainiacs like that, they don't realize when they're over thinking. It's a school prank, a classic one, that's all it is."

There was no response, so Paige guessed the Oliver must be on the other end of a phone call. Her stomach lurched. She was running out of time. A quick glance at her phone told her she barely had fifteen minutes until the bombs went off – which meant less than that before the FBI blew up the house. If she didn't try now, she wasn't going to have time to escape. She had to do it with Ammo in the next room and risk getting caught.

Thankfully, Paige was light on her feet. Using the wall for support, she mounted the makeshift tightrope, only momentarily wavering while her balance adjusted. From several feet up, her chest was nearly level with the window. She paused for a moment. It had been a long day, her adrenaline was pumping but she could feel the exhaustion through it, she was nearly dizzy with fear and she needed a moment to compose herself.

Paige reached out with her hands and began to pull herself through. Her arms and head instantly grew warmer as they hit the sunlight. She paused to take in her surroundings – the yellow flowers probably went ahead for fifty yards, then, beyond what looked like a ditch, was brush. She could see the city in the distance.

There wasn't much cover, but Paige had no other options. She wriggled through the window, having brief difficulty when the tiny space struggled to let her shoulders and chest pass through at the same time. She remembered the day Ralph was born; the words _shoulder dystocia_ ran through her head as she squirmed forward, uncomfortable, until her chest was through the window. With most of her weight on the other side and with nothing to support it, Paige fell forward, taking most of the impact of the fall on her outstretched hands and then rolling forward into a somersault. Somehow, when she found herself in a sitting position on the ground among the yellow flowers, it was her pelvis that was protesting the most. She shook out her hands, surprised at the lack of pain, and then shakily rose to her feet and fished her phone out of her bra.

The screen was cracked. She kicked herself for not realizing that she could have put it back in the pocket of her jeans the whole time. Shoving in her back pocket, Paige glanced around. The place was quiet, if she'd grunted at her impact with the ground it didn't seem to have drawn any attention to her.

But what would draw attention was a taller than average woman walking across the front yard of the man who had abducted her with the intention of using her presence to keep himself safe while he bombed Los Angeles. Paige dropped down to her knees. The flowers were several feet high. If she crawled, she had fifty yards of cover.

* * *

"Go! Go! Go!"

Walter jumped from the aircraft, falling the five feet to the ground, and lost his balance, rolling over a few times before scrambling back to his feet and sprinting to the waiting truck. "Kathryn Walls!" shouted the driver in greeting.

"Walter O'Brien!" he yelled as he launched himself into the passenger seat. "Drive!"

"What's your plan?" she said in a slightly lower tone as the sound from the aircraft lessened.

"Get to the house," Walter said. "Have him think we are trying to enter from her," he pointed to a spot on the blueprint, "but actually, I'll be going in here. He'll think we've determined that the basement is where he has Paige, and the best place to reach the basement is right along this wall. But in reality, Paige is here. I'll enter the house from this window."

"Shouldn't I do that?" she said. "And you be the distraction? I have training in this sort of thing."

"They see a professional like you and they won't think about there being a diversion," Walter said. "You have to be the diversion. How far?"

"Three more miles."

* * *

Paige tried to take a running start and leap the ditch, but the combination of her aching head, pelvis, and ankle didn't agree with her ambition and she didn't make it, sliding down into the warm, muddy water. She pulled herself out, clambering to the other side, glad that most of the mud was on her jeans and the bottom of her shirt and not where it would obstruct her vision. It was uncomfortable, but not debilitating.

She kept running. There was a road maybe a quarter mile ahead, if she could get to it, maybe she could find a ride out of the area. She could be back in Los Angeles in an hour or so, and she could help the team deal with the aftermath of whatever happened today with the explosives. Then she could go home and cuddle her son until he fell asleep whether it was his first choice of activity or not.

* * *

Walter was glad that Walls trusted him on his evacuation plan for Paige, because he wasn't even sure if it would work himself and he didn't have time to self doubt at the moment. They had maybe, maybe ten minutes to save Paige, less than fifteen before the bombs were supposed to go off, and according to Sylvester's texts they'd only found three and were running out of options. He could feel his heart beating in at least four different places and rolled down the window of the truck for air. If Paige didn't make it, he didn't know what he would do. Then…

"Stop the truck!" He shouted, so suddenly and so forcefully that Walls complied immediately, slamming on the breaks and jerking the truck to a halt. Walter threw open the truck door and stood up, leaning out and squinting to see the figure that was running in the direction of the road. She was at least a hundred yards away, she was dirty and had a limp, but a brief glance back at Kathryn Walls confirmed to Walter that this was not wishful thinking, this was not a mirage, but this was

" _Paige_!"

Paige stopped, startled, wondering if she was imagining things like she had been convinced the truck itself had been in the first place, just a fantasy of an exhausted, fear stricken woman with time running out.

But she wasn't imagining it. She knew that voice and that voice was real and it was just in front of her, much closer than the house she'd escaped from. "Oh my god," she said, her voice cracking as she began to painfully move forward again. "Walter!"

He began to jog toward her, and although she wanted to run to him, wanted to feel something familiar, the pain in her pelvis and ankle and the relief she was feeling at seeing him combined to make her feel unable to run another step. She managed a few more, then slowed down and stood there, shoulders drooping, as Walter ran up to her. When he was just yards away, she took one more step forward, meeting him, their momentum carrying them against each other and she gave a loud sigh of relief as she wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her head as his arms came securely around her. "Walter," she mumbled.

"It's okay," he said, rocking her back and forth, holding her tightly enough to hold her up should she not have been able to herself. "It's okay."

She pulled back and looked at him, searching his eyes for an answer even before she asked the question. "Ralph…"

"Happy and Toby have him. He's okay."

His hand found the way to the side of her face, then trailed down to join is other hand around her back. Then his forehead was pressing against hers, and she closed her eyes, both her hands on the side of his neck. They stood that way, silently, for several moments, a quiet reassurance that they really were together, everything really was okay.

* * *

They were barely back in the truck when Walter's phone rang. "I think we're screwed, Walter," Toby said. "They found the second bomb, then the fourth bomb, and then the first bomb, all nicely labeled, considerate guy, but we got nada on the other one. Cabe is preparing to take Ammo out."

"There is no third bomb!" Paige shouted suddenly.

Kathryn Walls looked at them in the rearview mirror. "How do you know?" She called back.

"Ammo was on the phone with someone named Oliver," she said. "He was talking about how Scorpion would overthink things and his plan was just like a children's prank."

"The pigs?"

"Exactly."

"What pigs?" Walter asked.

"Classic school prank. They set three pigs loose in the school labeled pig one, pig two, and pig four. Everyone spends the rest of the day looking for pig three. Ammo hates law enforcement so much that even if our teams found the other three bombs, we'd waste so much time looking for the fourth one."

"It makes sense, I suppose," Walls said. "I mean…the guy is, or was, depending on if they've taken him out yet, a complete whack job."

"I'm just glad he put me in a room with that eyebolt," she said, closing her eyes and resting her head on Walter's shoulder. He raised his eyebrows. "You want to give us some context?"

"Mmm," she said. "Maybe later."

* * *

"How is she doing?" Cabe asked quietly.

Walter was standing on the far side of the room, silently watching Paige and Ralph. She was laying on the couch, stretched the entire length of it, and he was curled up in front of her, his head tucked under her chin. Their reunion hadn't been as quiet. Walter would be fine if he never had to hear Ralph scream the way he did as he ran to his mother again.

"I think she'll be okay. She's a little dehydrated and she'll sleep well tonight, but…" Walter nodded. "She'll be feeling better in the morning."

"Good." Cabe looked over at him. "You two aren't careful, you'll make each other gray by the time you're forty."

Walter nodded slowly as Cabe left. Across the room, Paige stirred, opening her eyes and running her hands gently through Ralph's hair. She caught Walter's gaze and lifted her head. He walked over to her. "Hey."

"Hey."

"Rough day today, huh?" he said, giving her a small smile.

She gave a short little laugh. "You could say that, I guess."

He dropped down on his knees in front of the couch. "You feeling okay?"

"Yeah," she said. "I think so. I mean…" She bit her lip, the fingers on her right hand flexing absentmindedly.

Walter reached out, curling his fingers around hers. "For a while there, I was...I was really worried that we were going to run out of time."

"You mean before the bombs went off?" Paige asked.

It was a loaded question; even Walter could tell. He cleared his throat again. "Not...just the bombs. Paige," he frowned, the look he always got when he wasn't sure how to choose his words. "I uh…I'm glad you were able to be so efficient in determining a means of escape." He looked at their hands. "I know I wouldn't have reacted, um, particularly well to losing you." An embarrassed smile came over his face. "Turns out when you care a lot about someone the…greater good can be a very complicated."

She smiled. "The team saved all those people…I got out of the house and you brought me home." She paused, still smiling. "We saved everybody."

Walter chuckled. "We did. You solved the case without even being officially working it." He smiled back at her. "I always had a feeling this is where you belong."

"Here?" she asked, raising her eyebrows slightly, the corner of her mouth turning up.

It was another loaded question. He nodded, squeezing her hand, the events of the day making it easier for him to be bold. "Yeah. Right here."

* * *

 **Hope everyone liked this! I don't know how much writing I'll get done before the premiere airs, since I have several WIPs to get updated, but I hope I can write some more stuff once we have the new season!**


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